From Futurism · Joe Wilkins · · 1m 30s
Union support hits a 21st century high
Americans want unions stronger than they have in 60 years, just as AI starts eating jobs.
In brief
Americans want unions stronger than they have in 60 years, just as AI starts eating jobs. Popular support for unions is at a 60-year high, but approval alone never won anything. Membership and organizing are what turned sentiment into power. Originally reported by Futurism.
Three squeezes at once
AI-driven job losses, inflation, and thinning worker protections are hitting US workers together. The response is a turn back toward labor unions.
A record 47 percent
Gallup found 47 percent of Americans want unions to hold more influence than they do now, up from 43 percent in 2023 and just 25 percent in 2009.
“setting, per Gallup, a new record for the 21st century”
Anti-union feeling is shrinking
Only 23 percent want unions to have less influence, a new low for the millennium. That is down from 26 percent in 2023 and nearly half the 42 percent peak in 2009.
Approval back to 1965
Overall approval of unions sits at 71 percent, matching Gallup's reading from May 1965. That year also marked the start of organized labor's long slide.
Sentiment is not membership
In 1965 nearly one in three Americans belonged to a union. By 2025 it was one in ten, even as strike activity back then ran long, averaging 25 days in 1965.
Militancy has to be built
Union power came from decades of organizing and concessions won the hard way, not from polling. Tapping that legacy is how workers could carve out protections against automation.
“one last chance to carve out protections against an automated future through workplace organizing”
At a glance
Popular support for unions is at a 60-year high, but approval alone never won anything. Membership and organizing are what turned sentiment into power.
